The Bridal Party

The story begins in Normandy, sometime around May. The main character, Mike Curly, is introduced, along with the news that his ex-girlfriend, Caroline Dandy, whom he dated for two years, is engaged and will be getting married in Paris. It explains that the two broke up because of Michael's lack of money. He was devastated and could not let go, evident by his insecurity and the fact that he carried around photographs of her. He also stayed away from other girls, that she would do the same with men. One day outside of a shop, he encounters Caroline and her fiancé, Hamilton Rutherford. Rutherford invites Michael to a string of events, including his bachelor dinner, a party, and tea. As they talk, his feelings for her resurge. As they parted ways, Michael feels he will never be happy again. At his hotel, the concierge delivers a telegram, which states that his grandfather died and that he would be inheriting a quarter of a million dollars. Because of his newly found fortune he seemingly out of nowhere inherited a sum of confidence, so he decides he will try to win Caroline back.

When he attends one of the parties, he meets Hamilton's father, and as more people arrive, he feels increasingly inadequate. When he finds Caroline, he is reluctant to tell her about his inheritance. They eventually dance together, and she explains how she is over him and that he should do the same. She says she feels sorry for him, and that she needs someone like Hamilton to make all the decisions. Gathering enough nerve, Michael writes to Hamilton to confront him about his intentions and asks him to meet in the bar of a hotel. Michael arrives and overhears Hamilton talking to another man about how easy it is to control a woman, and that you cannot stand for any nonsense—adding, that there hardly any men who possess their wives anymore and that he is going to be one of them. Michael becomes outraged and questions his out-of-date attitude. Hamilton strikes back, saying that Michael is too soft. Eventually, Hamilton says goodbye and leaves.

Michael rolls up at the next party with new clothing. A woman, Marjorie Collins, shows up and demands to speak to Hamilton, threatening to cause a scene. Michael avoids the drama and goes to see Caroline at her hotel. They argue about how Hamilton treats her, and Michael eventually confesses his love for her. He tries to explain to her he has money now that his love for her is true and that he can't survive without her. Caroline does not seem to care and she notices he has new, expensive clothes. At this point, Michael tells her about his inheritance. "I have the money, my grandfather left me about a quarter of a million dollars." quoted Michael. "How perfectly well! I can't tell you how glad I am... you were always a person who ought to have money." quoted Caroline.

Hamilton returns from the party and explains that the woman who tried to blackmail him gave him a secret code to a telegram. As he opens a telegram, he discovers that all of his fortunes are gone, because he had stuck with a mistake for too long. At the point when Caroline could decide to stay with Hamilton or leave him for a newly rich Michael, she surprisingly chooses Hamilton. Michael attends the ceremony, and he learns from an acquaintance, George Packman, that a man had offered Hamilton a substantial salaried job right before the wedding. As the reception carries on, Michael realizes that he has not thought of Caroline for hours and that he was cured from his inability to move on. He is no longer bitter, and the story concludes with him wondering which bridesmaid he has made a date with for that night.

The Jazz Age represented a break with tradition, due to the feeling of disconnect created by modernity. It was the "decade of prosperity, excess and abandon, which began after the end of World War I and ended with the 1929 stock market crash."^[2] Fitzgerald was included in the Lost Generation, a group of U.S. writers who grew up during the war and created their literary reputations in the 1920s. They were "lost" because in the postwar world, the values that were passed on to them seemed irrelevant. They possessed a spiritual alienation from a country that appeared to be "provincial, materialistic and emotionally barren."^[3] As James L. West, Penn State Fitzgerald scholar, said, "He [Fitzgerald] saw with considerable accuracy, the excesses and gaudiness of American society in the modern era—but he saw the great willingness of the heart that's also deeply American."^[4]